- UK: Police release five London-based men after arrests near airbase used by US
Source: CBC News [Canadian state media]
“British police said on Monday they had released on bail five men who were arrested on suspicion of terrorism and explosives offences near a British airbase used by the U.S., although they remain under investigation. Officers arrested the men in the early hours of Sunday after a tipoff that three large white vans were heading to the military airfield in west England. … The British government had given authorization to the U.S. to use bombers based at Fairford to strike Iranian missile sites that were attacking ships in the Strait of Hormuz. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards had warned Britain in July not to allow U.S. bombers to fly from Fairford, saying any base used to launch attacks would be a legitimate target. … Iran has repeatedly denied involvement in attacks or plots in the United Kingdom and elsewhere.” (09/28/26)
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/uk-raf-fairford-incident-9.7360562
- Apple ordered to pay $5.7bn after losing vibration tech patent suit
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“Apple has been ordered to pay $5.7bn (£4.3bn) in damages after a US jury found it had used another firm’s tech without permission. Audio firm Taction Technology claimed in 2021 that Apple had infringed two of its patents for haptics systems, which enable vibrations for actions such as receiving a message or pressing a button. This tech is built into devices like the iPhone and Apple Watch. Apple said it had not used Taction’s vibration tech and would appeal the verdict. ‘While we thank the jury for their consideration, we strongly disagree with today’s verdict and the damages awarded, which are entirely unsupported by the facts,’ it said. ‘Apple’s Taptic Engine is fundamentally different from Taction’s technology, which Taction’s own testing of Apple’s products confirmed during trial.'” (09/28/26)
- Trump administration finalizes repeal of Biden-era Title IX rule
Source: Politico
“Education Secretary Linda McMahon on Monday unveiled a final regulation that seeks to restore a rule on how sexual misconduct is investigated on college campuses. The final rule, which is expected to officially publish Tuesday, comes after federal courts vacated a Biden administration regulation that sought to strengthen discrimination protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity. The rule ‘clears the Biden Administration’s illegal rewrite of Title IX’ from federal regulations and ‘restores the commonsense language’ of the rule adopted during the first Trump administration, which the second Trump administration has been enforcing, McMahon said in a statement.” (09/28/26)
- North Korean regime uses UN platform to lament “mutual distrust” and tension
Source: SFGate
“North Korea used its yearly U.N. platform on Monday to warn other world leaders of ‘a harsh reality rampant with unprecedented mutual distrust and confrontation,’ but said that it would endure and, in a multilateral world, ‘surely attain all that we plan to, relying entirely on our own efforts.’ It was, by Pyongyang’s standards, a relatively mild speech that contained no direct threats. The annual opportunity for the country, whose formal name is the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, to speak on the world stage fell this year to Vice Foreign Minister Kim Son Gyong. Like many nations, he touted the notion of U.N.-focused multilateralism, yet repeatedly insisted that North Korea could — and would, if necessary — go it alone.” (09/28/26)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/in-a-relatively-mild-speech-north-korea-uses-un-22453227.php
- Accused drug lord known as “The Spider” extradited to California from Colombia
Source: CBS News
“A Colombian warlord, whose extradition to the United States had been delayed for several months while he was designated a peace negotiator by the country’s previous government, was flown to California and placed in custody of federal agents. Geovany Andres Rojas faces drug trafficking and terrorism charges in the United States. For years, he acted as a spokesman and leader of Comandos de la Frontera, a rebel group known for trafficking cocaine in Putumayo, a Colombian province that borders Ecuador and Peru. … a new government, led by conservative President Abelardo de la Espriella, lifted the ban on Rojas’s extradition, signaling a shift in the nation’s security strategy.” (09/28/26)
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/drug-lord-the-spider-extradited-to-us-from-colombia/
- UK: Regime tries to stop Trump’s diesel export ban
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“The UK is in talks with US authorities over a potential stoppage of diesel exports and has started preparing for a ban, Chancellor John Healey has told BBC News. Diesel prices in the UK reached a new high on Monday due to supply pressures springing from the US-Israel conflict with Iran and Russia’s war with Ukraine. Fuel prices are rising globally and US President Donald Trump has threatened to ban diesel exports, stating at the weekend: ‘We’re thinking about it very seriously’. Healey, who admitted that UK diesel prices are ‘extreme’, said the government was in discussions with the US, adding: ‘We’re also making the provision that we may need to and we have our own stocks in the UK.’ Speaking on the sidelines of the annual Labour Party Conference in Liverpool, Healey said: ‘We work very closely with the Americans’. (09/28/26)
- Chinese, US regimes agree to mutually/partially undo recent tax hikes on their own serfs
Source: NBC News
“China and the United States have agreed to cut tariffs imposed on [buyers of] $60 billion worth of goods imported from each other, on an array of products ranging from U.S. corn to cosmetics, and from Chinese household appliances to toys. Under the U.S.-China Board of Trade, both countries have each recommended $30 billion of trade in non-sensitive goods for more favourable tariff treatment, United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said in a statement on Sunday. … The reciprocal tariff reduction as well as an extension of a trade truce were among the key takeaways from the second summit this year between Chinese President Xi Jinping and President Donald Trump, hosted in Washington last week.” (09/28/26)
https://www.nbcnews.com/business/consumer/china-us-tariff-cuts-60-billion-trump-xi-rcna600214
- MA: Maritime experts travel to Nantucket to investigate shipwreck remains exposed by nor’easter
Source: SFGate
“A maritime expert planned to visit a Nantucket beach Monday to inspect weathered wooden beams exposed by the weekend’s powerful nor’easter, possibly the remnants of a 19th-century shipwreck buried beneath the island’s southern shore. The Egan Maritime Institute said its exhibits and collections manager would survey the site and send a report to state underwater archaeologists, who then will work with the institute to determine which vessel the wreckage came from. The splintered timbers, fastened together by rusted iron, emerged near an area where remains believed to be from the Warren Sawyer, a wooden schooner lost in 1884, have been found before. Officials from Egan, a nonprofit that operates the Nantucket Shipwreck & Lifesaving Museum, cautioned Monday that the newly exposed wreckage has not been identified with certainty.” (09/28/26)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/maritime-experts-travel-to-nantucket-to-22452945.php
- Sweden: Regime Faces Political Deadlock After Andersson Gives up Attempt to Form Government
Source: US News & World Report
“Attempts to form a new government in Sweden hit the buffers on Monday after Social Democrat leader Magdalena Andersson said she was unable to secure enough support, despite the centre-left bloc winning a narrow majority in this month’s election. … The speaker of Sweden’s parliament is now likely to turn to Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson to see if he can form a government. Kristersson’s Moderates are the next biggest party after the Social Democrats. … Andersson would likely get another shot at trying to form a government if any centre-right attempt fails. The speaker can put four candidates forward to parliament for approval, but if each is rejected, Sweden will hold a new election.” (09/28/26)
- Senate Republicans scrap early exit from Washington as midterm stakes soar
Source: Fox News
“It’s a calculation by Republicans to keep the Senate in session this week. Yes. The Senate was scheduled to meet anyway over the next few days. But the general consensus early last week was that the Senate would be done then, and those facing competitive races would be back home campaigning. Then Wednesday hit. Republicans wanted to stay in Washington. For a very specific reason. And many of them told Senate Majority Leader John Thune [R-SD] as much at their weekly luncheon. ‘Odds are we plan on being here next week,’ said Thune. One Senate aide compared the Senate’s schedule to a cat chasing a beam of light from a laser pointer. But the Senate is in fact meeting.” (09/28/26)
- French prosecutors seek two-year sentence for Rachida Dati in Renault graft case
Source: France 24 [French state media]
“France prosecutors on Monday sought two years with an electronic tag and a five-year ban on public office for ex-culture minister Rachida Dati in a trial on corruption charges linked to dealings with the Renault-Nissan group. They sought a four-year jail term for Carlos Ghosn, the fugitive former Renault-Nissan chief now living in Lebanon, who is being tried in absentia as part of the same trial in Paris. … [Dati] stands charged with corruption and influence peddling over alleged lobbying for Renault-Nissan between October 2009 and February 2013 while she was a member of the European Parliament.” (09/28/260
- British chess prodigy Bodanha Sivanandan, 11, becomes youngest female grandmaster
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“A British child chess prodigy has become the youngest player in history to earn the woman [sic] grandmaster (WGM) title. Bodhana Sivanandan, 11, from north-west London, secured her third and final WGM norm – a certified title-level performance – while representing England at the 46th Chess Olympiad in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, the International Chess Federation (FIDE) confirmed. Speaking to FIDE, Sivanandan said she was happy about the achievement but wanted to ‘keep making history’. It is the latest milestone in a remarkable rise for the schoolgirl, who has already become Britain’s youngest women’s [sic] chess champion and the youngest person to represent England internationally in any sport.” [editor’s note: The BBC headline calls her a “woman”; I attempted to fix that, since last I knew an 11-year-old human was still a “child” – SAT] [additional editor’s note: Whether the person in question is either biologically or mentally a “child” or “adult” isn’t something that can be determined by drawing a number out of a hat; all the number indicates is that she is legally a “minor” – TLK] (09/28/26)
- Hungary: Parliament suspends immunity for PM Magyar and two Orbán-era ministers
Source: ABC News
“Hungary’s Parliament voted on Monday to lift the parliamentary immunity of three lawmakers, including the country’s prime minister, Péter Magyar, as prosecutors proceed with ongoing criminal investigations. Prosecutors are investigating Magyar on suspicion of misdemeanor theft after he allegedly took a man’s mobile phone during a nightclub altercation and threw it into the Danube River in June 2024, nearly two years before his party won a landslide election that unseated former populist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. … Lawmakers on Monday also voted to suspend the immunity of two former ministers in Orbán’s government who are suspected of, separately, criminal mismanagement of 17.3 billion forints ($53.6 million) of public funds and accepting more than 12 billion forints ($37.2 million) in bribes and kickbacks.” (09/28/26)
- Trump administration lowers fuel economy standards
Source: SFGate
“The Trump administration on Monday released new fuel economy standards that relax regulatory requirements for automakers to control pollution from gasoline-powered cars and light trucks. The new rules were released shortly after President Donald Trump rejected an Iranian proposal to open the Strait of Hormuz, sending oil prices soaring.” (09/28/26)
- Congo: Ebola outbreak tops 8,000 confirmed cases as disease remains out of control
Source: Seattle Times
“The number of confirmed cases of Ebola virus in Congo has surged past 8,000, as the country runs out of health workers to contain the deadly disease. Congo announced an outbreak on May 15, caused by the rare Bundibugyo virus, which has no known treatment or vaccine, and has struggled to contain it. Latest data from Congo’s health ministry showed that 8,067 cases have been confirmed, with 3,901 deaths as of Sept. 26 across 63 health zones in seven of the country’s 26 provinces, with a fatality rate of more than 48%.” (09/28/26)
- Brent crude tops $108 as Trump rejects Iranian proposal to reopen Hormuz Strait
Source: CNBC
“Oil prices jumped Monday in Asia trading after U.S. President Donald Trump rejected an Iranian peace proposal aimed at ending the Middle East conflict and reopening the Strait of Hormuz. U.S. crude futures for November delivery rose 3.3% to $95.46 a barrel as of 4:57 a.m. ET, while international benchmark Brent gained 3.66% to $108.14 a barrel. Trump turned down Iran’s conditional offer to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and told aides he expects U.S. strikes on the country to resume after November’s midterm elections, The Wall Street Journal reported Saturday, citing unnamed U.S. officials.” (09/28/26)
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/09/28/oil-price-today-wti-brent-trump-iran.html
- Russian attacks kill eight in Ukraine after Moscow vows to continue war
Source: France 24 [French state media]
“Russian strikes killed eight people across Ukraine on Sunday, a day after Moscow vowed to pursue the war, authorities said Sunday. … On Saturday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told the UN General Assembly his country intended to continue its military campaign ‘to the end’.” (09/27/26)
https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20260927-russian-strikes-kill-eight-ukraine-war-moscow
- Venezuelans Rally to Demand Opposition Leader’s Safe Return and Presidential Elections
Source: US News & World Report
“Supporters of Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado took to the country’s streets on Sunday to demand her safe return and presidential elections that could lead to a democratic transition in Venezuela. The government has been widely accused of stealing elections, jailing dissidents and stifling freedom of speech. In Caracas, hundreds of activists in sky blue shirts — the color of Machado’s Vente Venezuela party — rode motorcycles and drove through the city’s main avenues, honking their horns and waving Venezuelan flags. Similar demonstrations were held in state capitals including Valencia, Maracaibo and Merida. … Machado has been living in exile for the past nine months, and has had her plans to return to Venezuela spoiled multiple times. Opposition activists have accused Venezuela’s government of blocking her return, a claim denied by Venezuelan authorities.” (09/27/26)
- Trump Offered to Sell Arms to China, US Ambassador Says
Source: Seattle Times
“President Donald Trump has asked Chinese President Xi Jinping whether he would like to buy U.S. weapons, David Perdue, the U.S. ambassador to China, said in a television interview Sunday. ‘President Trump continues to say, ‘Hey, we sell arms to other people around the world,’’ Perdue said on ‘Fox News Sunday’ while discussing the state visit by Xi to Washington last week. ‘He actually asked President Xi would he like to buy some at one point.’ Perdue did not give further details and did not reveal Xi’s reply. … When asked for comment, the White House said through a U.S. official that the United States had no plans to sell arms to China. The State Department said in a statement that ‘U.S. law prohibits arms sales to China, and there is no offer or plan to sell arms to China.'” (09/27/26)
- Serbia: Vucic resigns as president to run for prime minister
Source: The Guardian
“Serbia’s populist president, Aleksandar Vučić, has resigned to pursue an attempt to become prime minister in an early parliamentary election that will test his firm rule in the Balkan country after nearly two years of protests. Vučić’s second presidential term would otherwise end in May next year. He is banned by the constitution from seeking a third term and said he was resigning to lead his rightwing Serbian Progressive party (SNS) in the 25 October ballot. The governing populists face a major challenge from a youth-backed movement that led protests triggered by a train station canopy collapse in November 2024 that killed 16 people in the northern city of Novi Sad.” (09/27/26)
- The legacy of Clarence Thomas will be declining trust in the Supreme Court
Source: The Hill
by Juan Williams“Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is a singular figure in U.S. history. If he remains on the bench for the next two years, he will be the longest-serving justice in American history. But his singular place in history is now tragic. First, he is at the heart of a historic decline in public trust in the Supreme Court. Second, as the most powerful Black Republican in national politics, he has damaged trust in Black conservatives as a source of innovative thinking for dealing with racial problems. … several Democrats running in the midterms appear focused on Thomas as they propose ethics codes, term limits and even adding more seats to the court to restore ideological balance. That political push began after investigative reports showed Thomas accepted, without disclosure, luxury vacations, help with tuition for a relative and real estate funding for his mother from a wealthy Republican.” (09/28/26)
https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/supreme-court/6114201-thomas-supreme-court-legacy/
- Be Kind To Your Adult Children Or They’ll Stop Talking To You
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone“The Wall Street Journal has a new article out titled ‘Why Are So Many Adults Cutting Off Their Parents?’ about the rising levels of family estrangement in our society. ‘Many experts believe that estrangements between adult children and their parents are becoming an epidemic in the U.S., just like divorce in the 1970s,’ writes Elizabeth Bernstein. ‘Much like then, the movement is driven by a convergence of large societal trends — this time the rise of social-media algorithms, changing therapeutic approaches and a broadening definition of trauma.’ As has become the fashion these days, Bernstein largely pins the blame for this phenomenon on TikTok. ‘Last month, more than 138,000 new videos that mentioned cutting off or going low-contact with parents were posted on TikTok, up more than 10-fold compared with August 2020,’ Bernstein writes, adding that ‘More than 82% of the posts were by women.'” (09/28/26)
- Supreme Court Reauthorizes SAVE Program, but It’s Not as Big a Deal as Some Would Have You Believe
Source: Cato Institute
by Stephen Richer“A number of critics scoffed at the notion of the SAVE program being used responsibly (‘Used responsibly?? HAHAHA as if. This will be abused as much as it can be to disenfranchise voters wherever possible.’) I get it. There are valid reasons to be concerned this election season. But the opportunity for abuse isn’t specific to the SAVE program. There are many tools election administrators have that, if used properly, improve voter list accuracy, but if abused, could lead to adverse actions against registrants. For example, election officials receive reports from the United States Postal Service’s National Change of Address portal (‘NCOA’) indicating when a registrant has moved, thereby prompting list maintenance activity. That tool could be abused just as easily as the SAVE program. That’s why it’s important for voter registration offices to have internal controls.” (09/28/26)
- Trump’s “Golden Fleet” Is Still Ridiculous
Source: Persuasion
by Francis Fukuyama“Of the many ridiculous, counterproductive, and outright harmful things that Donald Trump has done, his effort to create a ‘Golden Fleet’ of ‘Trump-class’ battleships is far from the worst offense. But it is absolutely typical of the personalistic and processless state into which American national security decision making has fallen in his second term.” (09/28/26)
https://www.persuasion.community/p/trumps-golden-fleet-is-still-ridiculous
- Why Cities Should Convert Public Property to Private Housing
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by D Dowd Muska“In a recent piece for Works in Progress, ‘a magazine of new and underrated ideas to improve the world,’ Zigmund Forrest and Maxwell Tabarrok noted that since ‘the completion of Battery Park City in 1976, there has not been a single major urban land reclamation project in the United States.’ The researchers believe that water-adjacent cities should ‘make more land’ to, among other things, boost affordable housing. But there’s another approach urban America can employ to promote budget-friendly homes, and it doesn’t require massive civil-engineering projects: Sell the properties it’s been hoarding.” (09/28/26)
https://fee.org/articles/why-cities-should-convert-public-property-to-private-housing/
- EA: The Good, the Bad, and the Buggy
Source: Bet On It
by Bryan Caplan“Effective altruists have been getting a lot of hate lately. But if you ever actually meet a group of effective altruists, even their harshest critics will struggle to maintain their anger. In person, they’re some of the most cheerful, friendly, curious, and smart people you will ever meet. Effective altruists are the opposite of the angry, self-righteous, apathetic, asocial youths who have given their generation a bad name. (And yes, strange as it seems, human beings can be angry, self-righteous, apathetic, and asocial at the same time). Not only are EAs extraordinarily likeable; they have also made strong arguments that have causally improved actually-existing philanthropy.” (09/28/26)
- Midterms a referendum on who runs your life
Source: Fox News
by Lisa McClain“The coming midterms lay bare a divide that runs deeper than policy and older than any party platform. Beneath every debate sits a single question, and it is the question on which this election turns: Who do you trust to run your life, you or the government? House Republicans’ answer is our closing argument. The current Republican majority arrived in Congress in January 2025 and spent the next 20 months answering that question. After record highs of hundreds of thousands of illegals [sic] streaming over the southwest border into the country under President Joe Biden, we’ve slammed the door shut. We now have the most secure border in modern American history. Families in El Paso, Texas, no longer worry about migrants roaming the streets at night.” [editor’s note: Yes, Republicans certainly answered that question — but not in anything like the way McClain seems to be claiming – TLK](09/28/26)
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/closing-argument-midterms-referendum-who-runs-your-life
- The Irresistible Appeal of Anarchism
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by George Ford Smith“War is a special preoccupation of governments. And governments, we all learn at a young age, are the foundation of civilization. Without government who would protect us from foreign and domestic threats? Trump finds Iran a threat, as George W. Bush found Iraq under Saddam a threat. A threat to whom? The American people, most of whom happen to live on the other side of the Atlantic. In today’s world and for most of history, ‘government’ means an organization with a territorial monopoly of force and is usually called a state. It is sovereign within this territory. To be under its jurisdiction is to grant approval of government’s right to enforce its commands or laws, one of which is the demand that it be supported economically. … Imposing a state on society doesn’t make life better.” (09/28/260
- Brightline shows people want more trains. But who will pay for them?
Source: Grist
by Benton Graham“With Amtrak smashing ridership records and Brightline’s ridership rising, Americans appear increasingly willing to travel by rail. Brightline’s financial troubles raise a more difficult question: Who will pay to build the infrastructure needed to give more of them that option?” [editor’s note: It seems obvious to me, but not to the author, that the people who should pay for passenger rail infrastructure are the people who run companies hoping to offer rail travel profitable to paying customers. If people really “want more trains,” they’ll pay for those trains – TLK] (09/28/26)
https://grist.org/solutions/brightline-shows-people-want-more-trains-but-who-will-pay-for-them/
- Sam Altman is Driving Drunk, Let Him Face the Consequences
Source: CounterPunch
by Dean Baker“Amidst all the talk of the need for government regulation of AI, there has been too little discussion of the simplest route: criminal liability. The basic story is that the AI companies are being irresponsible in dealing with a product they know to be dangerous. The companies and the people who run them need to know that they face serious monetary risk from letting their little models run wild, and possibly criminal prosecution and jail time.” (09/28/26)
https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/09/28/sam-altman-is-driving-drunk-let-him-face-the-consequences/
- Building an HVDC macrogrid, one line at a time
Source: Niskanen Center
by Rachel Levine“The U.S. electric grid is fragmented, with limited to no power exchange between regions and interconnections. This fragmentation increases costs to consumers and risks blackouts from power shortages during winter storms and heatwaves. One solution is the development of a ‘macrogrid’— a network of high-voltage transmission lines that can span the country and move power between regions, with relatively little loss of power over long distances. Building a macrogrid may seem daunting because of the sheer scale of such an effort, but it does not have to be built all at once. With modern technology, high-voltage direct current (HVDC) lines can be built one at a time and linked later to form a macrogrid.” [editor’s note: The larger the grid, the more people can lose power from a single failure, as we’ve seen in the past. We need more localized/decentralized power generation and delivery, not more failed century-old tech – TLK] (09/28/26)
https://www.niskanencenter.org/building-an-hvdc-macrogrid-one-line-at-a-time
- Once Recession-Proof, DC Feels the Pain From Federal Workforce Reductions
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille“The Washington, D.C. area has long had a reputation for being both wealthy and recession-proof, based on money forcibly extracted in the form of taxes from people living productive lives elsewhere in the United States. That may no longer be the case. Downsizing of the federal workforce concentrated in the DMV area—the District of Columbia and parts of Maryland and Virginia—has hit many residents hard, and some are considering leaving or have already done so. While it’s not nice to wish troubles on anybody, there’s nothing wrong with introducing government employees to the same risks and uncertainty that participants in the private sector face every day.” (09/28/26)
- The GOP’s 3-Step Scam: Break the Country, Blame Others, Then Claim Only They Can Fix It
Source: Common Dreams
by Thom Hartmann“Two years ago, Michigan Republican Mike Rogers stood in a grocery store for an advertisement blaming Joe Biden for the price of eggs (without mentioning the bird flu that was jacking prices). This week he’s back in nearly the same folksy jacket telling voters that it’s time for Trump to end his illegal war against Iran so gas prices can come down. Rogers new ad leaves out, of course, the fact that he’d cheered for the war on the day it began in February, claiming Iran was an imminent threat to the United States (it wasn’t and isn’t), and hit multiple rightwing podcasts and media opportunities to demand Americans unite behind Trump in prosecuting the war.” (09/28/26)
- Elon Musk’s Paper Billions Are Vanishing
Source: The Daily Economy
by Paul Mueller‘The global trillionaire count returned to zero not long after SpaceX’s IPO. Market fluctuations show the danger of imposing cash tax bills on stock-price wealth.” (09/28/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/elon-musks-paper-billions-are-vanishing/
- The Red Undertow in the Midterms
Source: Washington Monthly
by Charlie Cook“People in a president’s party might be satisfied, complacent, a little disappointed, or deeply disillusioned, but they are rarely pumped up and energized, thinking, ‘I can’t wait to go vote.’ Conversely, people in the opposition party, particularly in this era of hyperpartisanship, hate anything the president is doing. They hate everything he might even think about doing. Everything. They want to relitigate the last election. They can’t wait to vote. And then you’ve got this little slice of pure independents, and I’m not talking about the 45 percent of all adults or the third of all registered voters who claim to be independents but consistently lean toward and vote for one party. I’m talking about the three to six percent who don’t lean toward either party and are legitimate independents. They tend to be very fickle.” (09/28/26)
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2026/09/28/the-red-undertow-in-the-midterms/
- Threading the Development Needle
Source: Law & Liberty
by Patrick T Brown“Neighborhoods must find a balance between ‘voice’ and ‘veto.'” (09/28/26)
https://lawliberty.org/forum/threading-the-development-needle/
- Humility Is Civilization’s Price of Admission
Source: The Daily Economy
by Barry Brownstein‘A Canadian shop mailed me the hard-to-find part to save my wife’s old blender. How do prices help strangers cooperate on a scale no one can engineer?” (09/28/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/humility-is-civilizations-price-of-admission/
- Our Town Is Every Town
Source: Brownstone Institute
by Lucio Saverio Eastman“In-group or out-group. Clean or unclean. With us or against us. The post-pandemic world seems dominated by themes of a society corrupted by political hatreds, born of hostile emotions constantly on the hunt for targets. Remember the masked and the unmasked, the vaccinated and the unvaccinated, the essential workers and the nonessential? This wasn’t just a national issue. It burrowed deep into our personal lives and into our own hometowns.” (09/28/26)
- Mamdani’s claimed triumph over DoorDash “corporate greed” not all it seems
Source: New York Post
by Santiago Vidal Calvo“Mayor Zohran Mamdani wants New Yorkers to think he got DoorDash, one of the country’s biggest food delivery companies, to pay a huge $131.5 million settlement to its workers at his command. ’DoorDash underpaid more than 260,000 workers, and today we are getting that money back,’ he boasted last week. Headlines aside, that’s hardly the full story. Yes, DoorDash made a mistake. The company admitted that $6.6 million in payments never reached NYC Dashers, and that a further $5.7 million arrived late. That’s unacceptable: Gig-delivery workers deserve their earned wages, and the administration was right to ask for compensation and corrections. Yet that doesn’t mean $131.5 million was stolen from workers by a greedy delivery company, as Mamdani suggested Tuesday in a press conference complete with a giant prop check.” (09/28/26)
https://nypost.com/2026/09/28/opinion/mamdanis-triumph-over-doordash-greed-isnt-all-it-seems/
- The Least Bad Option
Source: Town Hall
by Alan Joseph Bauer“Western countries, including the US, will have to make a choice. … One can spend endless hours dissecting October 7th, a fake genocide claim, Hamas, the Palestinians, etc. Or one can make the topic a very simple choice. The West can once again get rid of its Jews, or it can value their role in society and send away those who are fanning the flames against them. One does not have to like Jews. He can list reasons, real or imagined, why he doesn’t like Jewish people. They have all of the money! They control everything! They are rude! Our religion teaches us to hate them! It doesn’t matter. All of us may have affinities or the opposite towards various groups, and far from this being ‘racism’, it is called being normal. If a person acts on these feelings, then his behavior might enter the world of racism.” (09/28/26)
https://townhall.com/columnists/alanjosephbauer/2026/09/28/the-least-bad-option-n2683665
- Let Europe Defend Europe
Source: Libertarian Institute
by José Niño“The tone shifts from one administration to the next. The premise never does. Every president treats European defense budgets as figures for Washington to set, audit, and enforce. That premise collapses on its own terms. Europe’s security belongs to Europeans. The continent commands an economy many times larger than Russia’s and fields two nuclear powers of its own. If Poland wants to pour 5% of its GDP into its army, Warsaw should make that call. If Spain values its welfare state more, Madrid should make that call. … As long as Washington sits at the head of the table, NATO serves as a vehicle for schemes hatched in the Pentagon, in think tanks, and among the oligarchs and defense contractors who profit from every new benchmark.” (09/28/26)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/let-europe-defend-europe/
- Social Media Has Not Brought Liberation
Source: Liberal Currents
by WBF“Social media has been a boon to autocratic regimes and their allied movements in democracies.” (09/28/26)
https://www.liberalcurrents.com/social-media-has-not-brought-liberation/
- Democracy Is Coming to Venezuela — Eventually
Source: The American Conservative
by Joseph Addington“Delcy Rodriguez, acting president of Venezuela, is preparing to put herself out of a job. In an address to the United Nations General Assembly this week, Rodriguez declared that Venezuela is getting ready for a return to democracy. ‘I want to make this very clear at this General Assembly: There will be elections in Venezuela,’ said Rodriguez Wednesday. ‘Venezuela has initiated a process of democratic transformation for its rebirth, an orderly, institutional, and verifiable process.’ Exactly when that orderly process will produce an election is not yet clear, although a rough plan is beginning to take shape.” (09/28/26)
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/democracy-is-coming-to-venezuela-eventually/
- Clarence Thomas, a Profile in Courage
Source: Law & Liberty
by Mark Pulliam“Justice Clarence Thomas’s brand of originalism is ‘going further,’ and he is now on track to set the Supreme Court’s longevity record.” [editor’s note: Sure, but how early in his tenure did that “brand of originalism” start getting tainted by the bribes he’s since been caught taking? – TLK] (09/28/26)
https://lawliberty.org/book-review/clarence-thomas-a-profile-in-courage/
- If Western Civilization is the Sickness, then Going Crazy Could be the Cure
Source: exile in happy valley
by Nicky Reid“Your average American is trapped, suffocating beneath the weight of a decaying civilization defined by the totally manufactured standards of an empire that only exists on television now. Your average American is bored, terrified, overworked, underpaid, overstimulated, heavily medicated and hopelessly in debt. Your average American is fucked; surrounded on all sides by forever wars, climate catastrophe, economic stagnation and constant adds disguised as softcore child pornography … So, then why the fuck shouldn’t they go fucking crazy? I was raped into a lifetime of traumagenic disassociation by rabid papists as a preschooler and even I feel bad for the beige plight of the average American. The current prevailing definition of mental illness is essentially making a violent break from mainstream reality but in 2026, mainstream reality itself is violently broken.” (09/27/26)
https://exileinhappyvalley.blogspot.com/2026/09/if-western-civilization-is-sickness.html
- The House Districts Where Democrats Are Still Fighting Each Other
Source: The American Prospect
by David Dayen“There are two kinds of elections happening this November, one of them quite strange. The natural focus has been on whether Democrats can win back the House and Senate. That’s the one that matters for the direction of the country. But thanks to California’s primary system, which advances the top two candidates to the general election, eight U.S. House races feature two Democrats taking on one another. Some feature incumbents with nothing more than token opposition, but several follow the main storylines from primary season: whether incumbents have grown too old and disconnected from their constituents to get another term, whether left-wing challengers can usher in a new generation of leadership, and whether big money will dictate voter decisions.” (09/28/26)
- It isn’t just the Second Amendment that is targeted
Source: The Price of Liberty
by Nathan Barton“Woke enemies of liberty have a lot of things these days that they want to get rid of. … The Second Amendment of course, is most prominent of the targets on their firing range. For decades, we’ve seen more and more conflict over the right to keep and bear arms. … But we know that the First Amendment is also one of targets of these enemies of liberty.” (09/27/26)
https://thepriceofliberty.org/2026/09/27/it-isnt-just-the-second-amendment-that-is-targeted/
- Tariffs are Even Less Popular than the Iran War
Source: Independent Institute
by Brady Leonard“If you listen to pundits, the cause of both the President and his party’s electoral struggles is the war in Iran. The war is deeply unpopular, 61% of voters disapprove of Trump’s handling of the conflict. Fuel prices have exploded since the beginning of the war and Iran’s predictable moves to control or at least disrupt shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. The price of gasoline has risen nearly 50% since February and diesel is up a whopping 75%. Bombs make headlines, and there are constituencies on both the far-left and far-right who have a particular obsession with the state of Israel, making conflict in the Middle East an easy scapegoat, but this misses the root cause of the Right’s current woes.” (09/25/26)
https://www.independent.org/article/2026/09/25/tariffs-less-popular-iran/
- Government Is The Cause of Fuel Price Sticker Shock. Don’t Expect It to Be The Cure.
Source: Garrison Center
by Thomas L Knapp“As Thomas Sowell wrote in 2013, ‘sometimes it seems as if there are more solutions than problems. On closer scrutiny, it turns out that many of today’s problems are a result of yesterday’s solutions.’ Government perceives, or even creates a problem. In this case, the US government created the problem of high fuel prices with its war on Iran. Government intervenes in markets to ‘solve’ the problem. But that intervention creates new, different problems — usually while failing to solve the previous problems. And those new problems are addressed with yet more interventions. At every point in that never-ending loop, things get generally worse than they were before the latest intervention, and even in specific areas it’s usually hard to discern any improvement.” (09/27/26)
- ‘Civil terrorism’ is a dangerous category error
Source: Expression
by Matthew Harwood“Activists who commit crimes should be punished. But they shouldn’t be prosecuted as terrorists.” (09/26/26)
https://expression.fire.org/p/civil-terrorism-is-a-dangerous-category
- Religious ‘integralists’ on the right, meet your socialist soulmates
Source: Washington Post
by George F Will“Undeterred by the axiom that there can be indecent exposure of the mind as well as the body, the Democratic Socialists of America candidly announce their agenda. Religious ‘integralists’ should be similarly explicit. DSAers want to scrap the Constitution in order to facilitate confiscating wealth, private property and other impediments to government-enforced equality and social perfection. Christian integralists, who are disproportionately Catholic, are devout and determined to make the nation more so. They would enliven politics if they would specify the measures they advocate to (as they mistakenly say) return America to being a ‘Christian nation.’ Integralists want to integrate spiritual and temporal (government) power, subordinating the latter to the former.” (09/25/26)
- America needs an ironclad, bipartisan commitment to press freedom
Source: The Hill
by Dan Perry“The warning signs have accumulated for years: Trump’s ‘fake news’ obsession, the Associated Press access dispute over ‘Gulf of America,’ new Pentagon restrictions on reporters and battles with media companies facing federal decisions. Seen separately, these episodes can look idiosyncratic, even absurd. Seen together, they raise a serious concern about using government power to shape who can cover the government and on what terms. That is why the response should extend beyond journalism. The proposed statement should be narrow enough to attract people who disagree about almost everything else. Its purpose would be to establish a rule for presidential power, not adjudicate the merits of CNN, Fox, Trump or or any particular story.” (09/27/26)
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/6112000-trump-white-house-press-ban/
- Self-Governing Is a Modern Miracle
Source: Town Hall
by Jeff Davidson“With our semiquincentennial on July 4 now history, we are at the start of our 240th year since the ratification of the U.S. Constitution, the vital document that has long guided our nation and which Leftists fervently seek to dishonor and destroy. Those who are highly knowledgeable about American history are likely familiar with this story: In September 1787, Elizabeth Willing Powel, a premier social figure within the Colonies, approached Benjamin Franklin after the signing of the Constitution. She asked, ‘Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?’ Franklin answered with a reply for the ages, ‘A republic, if you can keep it’. Franklin understood that creating a government of and by the people was a tenuous undertaking.” (09/26/26)
https://townhall.com/columnists/jeffdavidson/2026/09/26/self-governing-is-a-modern-miracle-n2683565
- An Open Letter to Scott Alexander
Source: Quillette
by Steven Pinker“The dangers of AI are real, but doomerism may be counterproductive.” (09/26/26)
- Incentive or selection
Source: David Friedman’s Substack
by David Friedman“There are two quite different models of why democracy works held by people who think it does. One is a model of incentives, one of selection. The incentive version relies on the fact that politicians want to get elected and reelected. To get elected they have to support the policies that a majority of the voters want; to get elected again, they have to actually work for those policies. … The selection model relies on the facts that people differ and that we have some ability to tell what other people are like.” (09/26/26)
https://daviddfriedman.substack.com/p/incentive-or-selection
- Ron Paul Liberty Report, 09/28/26
Source: Ron Paul Liberty Report
“Republicans Scramble As Midterm Fears Mount.” (09/28/26)
- NPR Politics Podcast, 09/28/26
Source: National Public Radio [US state media]
“What’s next for the Freedom Caucus?” (09/’28/26)
https://www.npr.org/2026/09/28/nx-s1-5983414/whats-next-for-the-freedom-caucus
- Caleb O. Brown discusses new school choice options for Kentucky families
Source: Bluegrass Institute
“Caleb O. Brown joined Kentucky Focus to discuss how in 2027 Kentucky’s HB 1 introduces a new scholarship tax credit program aiming to provide families with more educational options and supplemental resources.” (09/28/26)
- Rising, 09/28/26
Source: The Hill
“Robby Soave gives his radar on the upcoming film ‘The Social Reckoning,’ which portrays the events surrounding the 2021 leak of Facebook documents.” (09/28/26)
https://thehill.com/hilltv/6101138-rising-september-28-2026/
- The Spell that Made Everyone Good
Source: Underthrow
“[A] short animated parable on force, freedom, and the power of human respect.” (09/28/26)
https://underthrow.substack.com/p/the-spell-that-made-everyone-good
- The Daily Blast With Greg Sargent, 09/28/26
Source: The New Republic
“Trump’s Rage Over Failing Press Ban Goes Off Rails in Epic Self-Own.” (09/28/26)
https://newrepublic.com/article/215898/trump-rage-failing-press-ban-goes-off-rails-epic-self-own
- Rich Baris on The Scott Horton Show
Source: The Scott Horton Show
“Scott interviews Rich Baris about his new book and the broader political trends he’s uncovered through his work as a pollster. Baris shares some unique insights into the dramatic shifts happening on both the left and right—especially with younger Americans—that are going mostly unnoticed thanks to antiquated polling conventions.” (09/27/26)
- The Headlines, 09/28/26
Source: New York Times
“Possible Terror Plot Thwarted at U.K. Base, and Amazon Drones Overwhelm a Texas Town.” (09/28/26)
- Free Talk Live, 09/27/26
Source: Free Talk Live
“Clavicular innocent? :: Garbage trucks spy on houses for the government :: Why Austin, TX sucks :: To Entrap A Predator :: Trump TV is awful :: Hog hunting in northern MI :: Elephants save rhinos from hunting :: 2026-09-27 :: Hosts: Bonnie, Lori, Rich E Rich.” (09/27/26)
- The Remnant with Jonah Goldberg, 09/28/26
Source: The Dispatch
“Inside Israel’s War Room | Interview: Elliot Kaufman and Yonah Jeremy Bob.” (09/28/26)
- Parallax Views w/ JG Michael, 09/27/26
Source: Parallax Views w/ JG Michael
“‘Late Empire Floundering’: The Paramount-Warner Bros. Merger Makes No Sense w/ Nat Wilson Turner.” (09/27/26)
- Neon Liberalism, episode 92
Source: Liberal Currents
“The War with Iran Has No End.” (09/27/26)
https://www.liberalcurrents.com/the-war-with-iran-has-no-end-neon-liberalism-92/
- Antiwar News with Dave DeCamp, 09/27/26
Source: Antiwar.com
“Trump Rejects Iran’s 7-Day Proposal To End War, Saudi Strikes on Yemen Market Kill 7, and More.” (09/27/27)
- Unattended Baggage, episode 358
Source: Unattended Baggage
“Keep Alex off the boat!” (09/26/26)
https://unattendedbaggage.substack.com/p/episode-358-keep-alex-off-the-boat
- Pink Flame of Liberty, 09/26/26
Source: Pink Flame of Liberty
“Wrapping Up Judicial Committee Opinions – New Hampshire Disaffiliation.” (09/26/26)
- The Good Fight, 09/26/26
Source: Yascha Mounk
“Simon Sebag Montefiore on the Origins of the Modern Middle East.” (09/26/26)
- Year Zero with Tommy Salmons, 09/26/26
Source: Libertarian Institute
“Chatting w/John Weeks.” (09/26/26)
- Freakonomics Radio, episode 688
Source: Freakonomics
“When Is a Bet Not a Bet?” (09/25/26)
- Rising, 09/25/26
Source: The Hill
“Lindsey Granger gives her lens on Tucker Carlson’s NPR interview, where he once again called for President Trump to be removed from office.” (09/25/26)
https://thehill.com/hilltv/6089759-rising-september-25-2026/
- Sal and Mark, episode 20
Source: Free Talk Live
“Mark is away this week, so his son Jack steps in for his first show with Sal. Sal goes through the backlash to his viral ‘Islam is a natural ally of libertarianism’ tweet and answers his critics. Then we play Sal’s talk to a room of cypherpunks in Amsterdam, covering agorism, the counter-economy, Ross Ulbricht, and the privacy tools you can use today. After that, Mark Edge sits down with David D. Friedman, author of The Machinery of Freedom, to talk about private law and arbitration, why you can’t opt out of the criminal justice system, plea bargains and wrongful convictions, the Chicago School, and his decades in the Society for Creative Anachronism and the Pennsic War.” (09/25/26)